Traverse City Film Fest At 13 Has Over 120,000 Admissions

The 2017 Traverse City Film Festival(TCFF), founded by Michael Moore in 2005, offered 229 screenings of 115 feature films and 66 shorts in its 13th year. The annual celebration of film welcomed over 120,000 admissions across 12 different venues, including 12 film school classes, six free filmmaker panels, seven parties, two live podcasts, and a gaming and new media gallery. A volunteer force of 1,600 volunteers, led by 360 volunteer managers, sold 80 percent of available tickets to these screenings and events, of which 142 were sold out.

For the first time in TCFF history, Moore was unable to attend the festival due to a conflict with his Broadway show “The Terms of My Surrender,” which opened Friday, July 28. His presence was strongly felt through his curation of the festival program, and he called in to introduce several screenings to the audience, including festival favorite “Mike’s Surprise.”

Festival Galas began Tuesday evening with three Opening Night screenings of “I, Daniel Blake” for which director Ken Loach sent a personally recorded introduction, and continued with the sold out Friday Centerpiece screening of “Step,” an inspiring documentary that follows a high school dance team in Baltimore. After the film, director Amanda Lipitz called in for a question and answer session. The festival closed with a sold out Northern Michigan premiere of Academy Award-winning director Kathryn Bigelow’s “Detroit,” which depicts events that took place 50 years ago amidst the turmoil of the Detroit uprising.

Audience Awards went to “The Divine Order” for Best Fiction Film and “I Am Evidence” for Best Documentary. The Founders Grand Prize went to filmmaker Raoul Peck for his two TCFF selections, “I Am Not Your Negro” and “The Young Karl Marx.” The festival’s awards ceremony was live streamed, and a complete list of winners can be found here: http://www.traversecityfilmfest.org/tcff-xiii-award-winners/.

Films at the Open Space drew record crowds of thousands each night for Hollywood favorites on a 65-foot screen on the shores of Grand Traverse Bay. A test screening of the Talking Heads concert movie “Stop Making Sense” in tribute to Jonathan Demme was followed by “Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby,” “La La Land,” “Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs,” “What About Bob?” “Star Wars: Episode VII -The Force Awakens,” and a “Moana” Sing-Along.

In a special sidebar, TCFF presented films made in Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria, and Yemen, countries whose citizens and filmmakers have been targeted by the Travel Ban. Filmmakers and subjects from these films appeared in person and via Skype, including Oscar-winning filmmaker Asghar Farhadi (“The Salesman”), to share stories and voices across borders, allowing festival-goers to learn more about these countries and their people.

The Food on Film Sidebar returned for a third year to staggering success. The best in culinary cinema was paired with a great selection of local chefs and renowned visiting subjects and directors who joined for post-film discussions, and to create bites inspired by the films for the audience to sample. This year’s sold out showcase featured a shorts program and four feature films, including “WASTED! The Story of Food Waste” presented by acclaimed NYC chef Mario Batali.

For the second year, the Traverse City Film Festival was a Certified Local Food Event, sourcing at least 20% of food served at the festival locally. TCFF, in partnership with Taste the Local Difference and with the aid of Oryana Community Co-op and S2S Sugar 2 Salt, represented the tastes of Northern Michigan by putting a focus on local restaurants and food providers.

The festival continued many of its popular traditions like Around the Bay, which brings special advance screenings of festival films to historic theaters in scenic Manistee, Frankfort, Elk Rapids, and Suttons Bay, and now to the newly opened Lyric Theatre of Harbor Springs.

As always, family-friendly activities are a highlight at the festival. The Free Lawn Party following the sold-out $1 Kids Fest movies moved to Clinch Park and was busier than ever, with thousands of little ones enjoying face painting, balloonists, caricature drawings, crafts, costume tents, martial arts, robotics, yoga, and FREE flipbooks every day!

Movies on a Boat, unique filmgoing excursions departing nightly on the Natui-Cat, the largest commercially sailing catamaran on the Great Lakes, returned for another sold-out run.

The Woz, the interactive new media and gaming gallery powered by Michigan State University, and situated in the beautiful new Hotel Indigo in TC’s warehouse distrivct, exhibited experiences and storytelling that go beyond traditional screens, introducing many to virtual reality through the extremely popular HTC Vive.

Two new temporary venues were added to the festival: 150-seat Kirkbride Hall at the Grand Traverse Commons, and 450-seat Central High School Auditorium, both equipped with state-of-the-art technology and designed by the world renowned high-end cinema experts at Boston Light & Sound. Both made great additions to the festival, receiving raves from patrons and filmmakers.

With new locations and expanded service, the festival’s Free, Green, and Easy Festival Loop Shuttle provided 6,568 rides to moviegoers thanks to our partnership with the Bay Area Transportation Authority and support from The Wege Family.

TCFF brought 110 filmmakers and industry guests from across the country and around the world to Northern Michigan, to accompany their films and participate with audiences.

Renowned film historian Leonard Maltin lent his presence as a guest at this year’s festival, participating in two podcasts, “Maltin on Movies” with his daughter Jessie Maltin, and “Doug Loves Movies” with podcaster and comedian Doug Benson. Famed for his Disney knowledge, Maltin introduced “Snow White”and “Moana,” as well as Harold Lloyd’s 1928 classic “Speedy” with the Alloy Orchestra. His handprints and signature were set in cement, to be displayed at the “Walk of Fame” in front of the festival-owned and operated State Theatre, which Maltin also toured. The State was listed as the #1 movie theater in the world to watch a movie by the Motion Picture Association of America.

Other notable TCFF XIII guests include comedian Gilbert Gottfried (“Aladdin,” “The Aristocrats”) presenting the documentary “Gilbert” with the film’s director Neil Berekeley; Mariska Hargitay (NBC’s “Law & Order: Special Victims Unit”) who produced “I Am Evidence,” joined by directors Trish Adlesic and Geeta Gandbhir as well as subjects Kym Worthy, Ericka Murria, Michelle Brettin, and Nicole DiSanto; Noël Wells (“SNL,” “Master of None”), director of “Mr. Roosevelt,” which won the Founders Award for Best US Fiction Film; and comedian Doug Benson, returning to TCFF with the “Doug Loves Movies” podcast and a Benson Movie Interruption of “Starship Troopers” on its 20th anniversary.

The Traverse City Film Festival is a charitable, educational, nonprofit organization committed to the idea that “One Great Movie Can Change You: Just Great Movies” and to helping save one of America’s few indigenous art forms — the cinema. The festival brings films and filmmakers from around the world to northern Michigan for the annual film festival in late July to early August.

It was instrumental in renovating a shuttered historic downtown movie house, the State Theatre, which it continues to own and operate as a year-round, community-based, and volunteer-staffed art house movie theater. The festival also renovated the historic Con Foster Museum building in Clinch Park and turned it into a sister screen for the State Theatre, the Bijou by the Bay.

The festival was founded by Academy Award winning director Michael Moore who makes his home here, runs the festival, and serves as president of the board of directors. Other board members are filmmakers Rod Birleson (producer, “Capitalism: A Love Story”), Larry Charles (director, “Borat”), Academy Award winning director Terry George (director, “Hotel Rwanda”), Jeff Daniels (actor, “The Newsroom”), Tom Morello (musician, Rage Against the Machine), Christine Lahti (actor, “Running on Empty”), Mark Cousins (director, “The Story of Film: An Odyssey”), Tia Lessin (Academy Award nominated director, “Trouble the Water”), as well as Traverse City residents photographer John Robert Williams and former Walt Disney Co. marketing executive Penny Milliken.

Comments Off on Traverse City Film Fest At 13 Has Over 120,000 Admissions

“I think [technology has[ its made my life faster, it’s made the ability to succeed easier. But has that made my life better? Is it better now than it was in the eighties or seventies? I don’t think we are happier. Maybe because I’m 55, I really am asking these questions… I really want to do meaningful things! This is also the time that I really want to focus on directing. I think that I will act less and less. I’ve been doing it for 52 years. It’s a long time to do one thing and I feel like there are a lot of stories that I got out of my system that I don’t need to tell anymore. I don’t need to ever do The Accused again! That is never going to happen again! You hit these milestones as an actor, and then you say, ‘Now what? Now what do I have to say?'”
~ Jodie Foster

“If there’s one rule Hollywood has metaphysically proven in its century ofexperimentation, it’s that there’s no amount of money you can’t squander in the quest for hits.

“Netflix has spent the past couple years attempting to brute-force jailbreak this law. Its counter-theory has seemed to be, sure, a billion dollars doesn’t guarantee quality but how about three billion dollars? How about five billion dollars? Seven?

“This week’s latest cinematic opus to run across no-man’s-land into the machine-gun emplacements has been the Jared Leto yakuza movie ‘The Outsider.’ Once again, debuting on Netflix, another thing called a movie that at one glance doesn’t look like any kind of movie anyone has ever seen before, outside of off-prime time screenings at the AFM.

“If you’re working at a normal studio, you have one or two of these total misfires in a year and people start calling for your head. How many is Netflix going on? Fifteen? Twenty? This quarter? Any normal company would be getting murdered over results like that.”
~ Richard Rushfield